3D OLEDs

China-based display maker CSoT demonstrated several new OLED display prototypes and technologies at SID 2019, and this great new video shows these displays in action.

First up is a 31" 4K (3840 x 2160, 144 PPI) AMOLED that was produced using an ink-jet printing process on an IGZO substrate. The peak brightness is 200 nits and the refresh rate is 120 Hz. This seems to be the same panel announced in March 2018 by Joshua Printing Display Technology (established by CSoT and Tianma in 2016). The display has some noticable defects.

The Fraunhofer FEP institute has successfully integrated its bi-directional OLED microdisplays into an VR / AR HMD (or dataglasses, as the Fraunhofer calls it) for 2D and 3D content.

The new HMD demonstrator uses the Fraunhofer's SVGA (800x600) displays and connects via a USB interface and an HDMI connection. The bi-directional displays can be used for eye tracking to support novel user interfaces.

San Francisco based Osterhout Design Group (ODG) announced that it raised $58 million from several investors, including Shenzhen O-film Tech and Vanfund Urban Investment & Development. This is ODG's round A investment, but it is not a new company - it has been active with enterprise AR solutions for eight years, and in 2014 it sold some of its IP to Microsoft for $150 million.

ODG R-7

Why does ODG need so much money? Because it is entering the consumer market with its upcoming codename-Horizon platform, which will be an AR/VR platform that is based on OLED microdisplays. The Horizon platform will support a wide FOV, 120 fps and support for 4K 3D content.

BOE Display had a large booth at SID, and the Chinese company demonstrated several new AMOLED prototypes - including large 10" panels and bendable OLEDs.

So first up we have 4.35" bendable and foldable OLED displays. The bendable panels offer a resolution of 1120x480 (HWVGA, 280 PPI) and a bending radius of 15 mm. The brightness is 350 nits. The color gamut is 100% NTSC. The foldable panels are the same - except the bending radius is much smaller at 5 mm.

Researchers at Canada's Queen's University Human Media Lab developed a prototype phone called HoloFlex that use a holographic lightfield 3D display that can "project" 3D images.

The HoloFlex uses a flexible 5.5" Full-HD (403 PPI) OLED display (seems to be the same LGD panel used in the G Flex 2) with a 3D-printed flexible lens-array on top, that forms a 160x104 matrix (16,640 lenses). Each lens projects the 12 pixel-wide circular area directly underneath it out into space.

eMagin announced that preliminary revenue for Q4 2013 was about $6.1 million. That's about $2 million less than expected. This ends a very challenging year for the OLED microdisplay maker. Looking forward, the company wants to strengthen their manufacturing processes and reach "acceptable" yield levels, and expects to return to revenue growth in 2014.

eMagin says that demand for their microdisplays remains strong, but there was a "shortfall in anticipated product revenue" for the quarter, resulting from equipment downtime, low yield and lower average sales prices. Contract revenue in the period is still low due to fewer government R&D contracts as a result of the U.S. government sequestration.

NVIDIA unveiled a new research project that developed a near-eye light field display. A prototype unit was shown that uses two Sony ECX332A OLED microdisplays (1280x720 each). The microdisplays are covered with a micro-lens array which creates the light field.

The basic idea is that users can focus at multiple depth and create a field of view of about 70 degrees. If you wear glasses, this display can account for your glasses using software algorithms. Check out the video above for more info.

Researchers from the Imperial College in London are researching the usage of Helicenes as emitter materials in OLED panels. Helicene based PLED emit circularly polarized light (they call these CP-OLEDs) and these may be useful for 3D OLEDs and other optical and photonics applications.

Helicenes are thermally-stable polycyclic aromatics with helically-shaped molecules. These molecules has unique structural, spectral, and optical features. The researchers found that when these molecules are used as emitter materials in OLED panels, they emit a light that is circularly polarized (not 100% though).

Samsung officially launched their 55" Super OLED TV today. The model number will be ES9500, but we still do not know the release date or price (some estimate it to be around 10 million Won, or $8,700). The ES9500 will support active-shutter 3D and also Samsung's Dual-View technology (enables two different 2D program via the active-shutter 3D glasses).

The ES9500 includes several smart interaction technologies including remote control, voice control, motion control and face recognition (it includes a camera). It features a Smart Evolution upgradeable dual-core CPU. Samsung says that color reproduction is 20% better compared to LED LCDs